In-Person Panel PS1.4

Dismantling Inequalities: Listening to the Subaltern

Intersecting Inequalities in Rakhine State, Myanmar: Authoritarianism, Climate Change and Youth

Joahanna Garnett

In Myanmar authoritarianism and climate change intersect, exacerbating already entrenched inequalities but also creating unique opportunities. Young people and their subaltern communities in Rakhine State, in the north-west of the country, are geographically and socio-politically exposed to the impacts of climate change and face many challenges. In an uncertain political, economic and social system, and in the absence of the state, young people from the grassroots are developing programs and mechanisms to respond to their rapidly deteriorating situation. They are focusing on food sovereignty, grassroots development and environmental peacebuilding embedded in local and traditional epistemologies. They are also utilising their skills and insights gained after a decade of relative freedom prior to the 1 February 2021 coup and from engagement with international academics and development workers with the aim of dismantling inequalities among some of the poorest communities in the state. Based on the argument that any such approach needs to be pragmatic, rooted in social structures, in the means and modes of production, and in the embodied practices of everyday life, this presentation provides insights into their traumatic experiences, gives voice to their concerns and discusses the potential of this youth cohort. This is important, not only in light of local issues but for lessons to be learnt for the region.

Singing Back: Operatic Resistance and Vocal Scholarship in Asia

Paul Smith

Despite a canon that commonly points towards 17th century Italian and European aesthetic origins, opera is a global form and opera singers are a global community. Tracing the multi-lingual and multi-hemisphere trajectory of professional contemporary opera singers reveals a unique mode of analysis into the types of meaning making that can occur within opera. The operatic form is dominantly a white space and singers-of-colour face ongoing and systemic exclusion from companies and performances. In addition to this, the tradition of musicological study locates the singer as unequal to the composer of the opera. Asian operatic singers therefore enact a doubly dismantling resistance. They reclaim both cultural and musical space and, I argue, engage in sung scholarship with the writers of the traditional works in which they perform. Singers do not simply return originals from the past, they songfully inscribe in the present a complex web of both dominant and subversive ideologies. In this presentation, I examine a recent performance by Korean soprano, Sumi Jo, of ‘The Doll Song’, from the opera The Tales of Hoffman. I also argue for the emancipation of the singer and point towards the liberating flight and equalising potency of sung language.

‘Still Puritan?’ The Right-Wing Underground Music and Musicians in Contemporary Indonesia

Hikmawan 'Indra' Saefullah

Abstract. The ‘Islamic underground movement,’ a self-proclaimed community of underground rock musicians and fans upholding Islamic values and way of life, was once vibrant. The movement was first born during the tumultuous period of Reformasi and posed itself as an alternative to the existing underground music and movement which they thought would corrupt their Islamic faith. After more than a decade of its emergence, most of the movement’s collectives, such as Liberation Youth, One Finger Underground Movement (OFUM), and Underground Tauhid appeared no longer active or disbanded. Overlooked by observers of this movement, there have been significant changes to their movement and musicians. Some of them were influenced by Sufistic Islam and thus toned down their militancy. Some others went in the opposite direction, embracing Salafism, a school of Islamic thought that strictly prohibits music production and consumption including for religious reasons, which contributed to the decline of the movement’s music productivity. Some others focused more on conventional religious activities, entrepreneurship, and taking on family responsibilities. In this paper, I aim to discuss right-wing underground music and musicians, and the sociopolitical and economic contexts behind their rise and decline in contemporary Indonesia.

Oral History, Hidden Christians, and the Roya no Sako Incident

Gwyn McClelland

Listening within oral history interviews offers an opportunity to reflect on the long process of dismantling inequalities, and what it may involve. In this presentation I will describe a collectively traumatic historic experience, the Roya no Sako incident on Hisaka Island, Goto, Japan, in 1868. Essentially, the island’s ‘kirishitan’ population was imprisoned in a small cell, and over forty people died as a result. I examine these ‘killings’ through the eyes of three descendant interviewees, for whom this incident was a foundational within their family histories, entailing religious and classist persecution. Considering this as a part of ‘Hidden Christian heritage’ is one part of my current Goto Islands oral history project. The presentation will include the opportunity to listen to excerpts from the interview, as emotion is shared through the intersubjective experience. Another community member who drove me to the ferry one day on the island, demonstrated that the rupture within that community carries through to some extent at least to the present day. Two of these interviews have been included in the Japan Past and Present project, supported by UCLA and Waseda University, and which will shortly be an exemplar for oral history online.